


Footprints

by CoelacanthKing



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Animal Gutting, Blood, Childhood, Family Member Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-27
Updated: 2016-02-03
Packaged: 2018-05-16 17:04:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5833564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoelacanthKing/pseuds/CoelacanthKing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The canopy was their sky, cloaking them as they walked the paths they had worn down themselves. Through crags in the rocks, following the creek uphill, searching for the lantern that hung from the bough of the old birch tree that grew near the fort.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A bit of self-indulgent mishmash that's been rolled out into something far more.

 

 

To Narssa, the Emerald Graves felt like coming home.

He recalled the afternoons when Spruce and Magpie had taken him into the forest without the supervision of the adults. Just three twiggy Qunari kids traipsing through the brush, leaving their footprints in the loam. Magpie would zip from tree to tree, looking for the mushrooms that grew beneath the bark and made it puff outward. They ate the savory fungus like candy, along with any berries that Narssa’s mother had told them were safe. When the weather permitted, they went to the creek and attempted to fish with their hands, rolling up trouser legs and wading in up to their knees.

Spruce would make animal sounds for him. The three of them would settle into the ferns, search out a path where nugs had made their way, and wait. Soon the little creatures would come loping along, sometimes right up to their faces, whistling and clicking in their strange little nug language. Spruce would make a noise with her tongue, a throaty pop, and all of the nugs would squeak and stand to attention. Magpie had caught one once, when it had ventured too near in curiosity. He said that they should bring it back home for supper, but Narssa’s father had bagged a ram the day before, so they settled for patting the nug on its velvety nose before letting it go. The thing hopped once, then sat down and began to groom itself nonchalantly, as if it hadn’t known how close it had come to ending up in a stew. Not the brightest animals, not by a long shot.

Green was a natural color, a safe color. The trees had personalities, the forest had a voice. The canopy was their sky, cloaking them as they walked the paths they had worn down themselves. Through crags in the rocks, following the creek uphill, searching for the lantern that hung from the bough of the old birch tree that grew near the fort. A silhouette would always be waiting for them in the doorway, eager to dole out hugs and look at scraped knees and elbows, stained clothes. There was always food and blankets waiting for them inside, a shoulder to lean on and get drowsy against, beds to get tucked into and kisses pressed against cheeks, and mothers who told you they loved you as you fell asleep. It had been right. It had been good.

Except when it hadn’t been. When the children had packs strapped to their shoulders and had been forced out in the middle of the night, squirming through a hole excavated at the back of the fort as Narssa’s father barricaded the gate, holding all of his massive bulk against it. They had never been in the forest after dark. They forgot where their familiar paths had gone, running, just running, ignoring the sounds of arson and foreign shouts behind them. And so, when the sun had risen, they knew were truly lost.

Magpie had been taken screaming two nights later, but not by beasts. There were other voices, voices that spoke in Qunlat, but their words were laced with an accent that marked them as not of their people. They hadn’t seen Narssa or Spruce, and Magpie was screaming for them to get away, go away, leave him. Spruce abandoned her twin to his fate and took Narssa deeper into the forest, severing the connection she and Magpie had shared since the womb.

I won’t let anything happen to you, she had promised him. Narssa believed her. He had loved Spruce. Loved her bright eyes and curved horns and her long braid. She had the best laugh. He loved her still when he woke one morning, bundled in the dirty bearskin blanket, to find that it was snowing, and that Spruce was looking up at the canopy without seeing. She’d left the folds of the blanket during the night, and her lips had turned a dark blue, snow accumulating on her body without melting. Narssa sat with her for a long time, understanding what had happened to her, but not understanding why. He’d wrapped her in the blanket and continued on without her.

Twenty years later it made the trek though the Emerald Graves more potent to him. They were beautiful, but they were sick too. He struck out against the Red Templars they found camped on the roads. He laid arrow after arrow into the spiders that skittered and screeched through the undergrowth, slew Free Men, and had to be pulled away from the carcass of a giant by Cassandra. It was dead, but he couldn’t stop. He gripped its matted mane and screamed, sending up fantails of blood with every stab. Cassandra caught his arm as he raised it to stab down again, yanking it behind his back and pushing him into the ground. He didn’t have the strength to stop her.

“Restrain yourself,” she hissed. “It’s over.”

She let him sit up, and Narssa put his head between his legs and sobbed. Cassandra was a hard woman, but she sat beside him all the same. She grunted at the sound of Cole approaching, and the spirit’s voice wasn’t a statement, but more like a question. “You are hurting. Killing the giant didn’t help, but you feel a little better now.”

He stood and dragged his hands over his face, flicking the tears and the blood away. Dorian stood apart, stave clutched to his chest and watching him with distress. Narssa felt something curdle with regret in his stomach; a fine thing to do in front of the man you were wooing. He’d apologize to him later.

“Come on. Let’s get back to camp.”

There was no banter, no small talk or snarky witticisms on their march through the Graves. The sun was setting, and from a nearby rise the silhouette of an August ram could be seen. Narssa looked, but did not see any paths other than the one they stood on. He didn’t see the lantern in the birch tree that would lead him home.

He let Cassandra and Dorian pass him, giving the latter a slight smile that said everything was okay. He walked alongside Cole, speaking in what could have passed for a whisper if the timbre of his voice wasn’t so deep.

“What’s the forest saying, Cole?”

From beneath the brim of his floppy headpiece, the boy’s eyes were wide and pale. He blinked, chewing on his lip before speaking.

“It says thank you.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I started Jaws of Hakkon yesterday. It gave me feels and the need to write.

 

 

Despite everything, their time with the Avvar was enjoyable. Stone-Bear Hold was well fortified, friendly, and happy to have agents of the Inquisition as guests of high esteem against their struggle with the Hakkonites. As the setting sun stained the sky in hues of plum and poppy, Narssa and his coterie were ushered into the hold’s longhouse and treated to songs and food and drink. Varric engaged in a friendly arm wrestle with a young hunter, and took on all subsequent challengers after his landslide win. Blackwall hid behind his mead as a flock of Avvar women fawned over him, likening him to a noble bear (and thus good husband material), and Cassandra of all people was pulled into a non-confrontational conversation on religion with the hold’s augur.

Thane Sun-Hair asked for the meaning behind the name ‘Adaar’, and Narssa confessed that it had been his father’s name. There was a collective nodding among the Avvar; a good sign, someone said. The Qunari name their own as we do. The Inquisitor smiled politely, not willing to inform their hosts that it actually couldn’t be further from the truth.

Narssa remembered his father as a quiet, weathered man. Older than his mother by a decade or more, Adaar had never spoken in anything louder than a murmur. Always smiling, easy to please, the old Qunari was to his son as a sun is to a planet; a massive constant, a center to orbit and adore, the warmth it emanates enough to sustain you by proximity alone.

“Do you miss being a blacksmith?” A seven year-old Narssa had asked, hands clasped behind his back, watching his father process a wild ram. Adaar had stripped down to the waist for the job, arms slick up to the elbows with blood and flecks of gore.

“Sometimes,” he hummed. “Sometimes.”

“But you couldn’t stay in Kont-aar, because the Ben-Hassrath would have found out what you did.”

“Yes.”

“And Taareth was going to have her babies, and you went to her because-“

His son’s chatter was enough to draw Adaar’s attention away from the ram, and he laughed.

“ _Kadan_ ,” he chuckled, eyes bright. “You know this story so well now. Come,” and he held out one bloody, beckoning hand towards Narssa, “Let’s give your knife some work to do.”

Narssa approached, and Adaar reached back into the ram to retrieve a slab of meat, removing it and slapping it down onto the skinned animal’s side. Narssa didn’t want to remove his shirt, so he elected to push his sleeves up to his elbows. He drew the knife from its sheath strapped to his leg, his grip loose.

“Do you remember what I taught you about the knife?”

‘’It isn’t a tool, it’s a person.’” The boy recited. “’Do not smother it, do not try to control it, and it will be your friend.’”

“Very good.”

Adaar balanced on the balls of his feet and watched patiently as his son cut strips of meat for jerky, carving against the grain slowly, methodically. He did as his father said, allowing his knife to do its work unhindered, and it rewarded him with lovely, even slices. The air was gummy and thick with the sweet reek of red meat.

“Well done,” Adaar praised as Narssa finished. He stood and wandered to the lodge to retrieve a rack for the strips to dry on, returning to find the boy turning the knife delicately over in his hands, staring at the carcass curiously.

“Do they respect knives under the Qun?”

The question seemed to stop Adaar in his tracks, and the look he gave his son was one of pure astonishment.

“No. To the Qun, a knife is a knife.”

“Why?”

“…Many people only ever get to use knives, or swords, or axes. They do not understand the effort it takes to make them. The commitment, the affection. It is a fine thing to be a craftsman, and to love the things you’ve made.” Adaar crouched, but even then he was at least half a head taller than Narssa. His arms still bloody, he leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to the base of one of his son’s stubby horns, holding it, then pulling away with a smile. He gathered the strips of meat, arranged them on the rack, then stood and wandered back into the lodge.

And Narssa stood there beside the stripped ram, blinking, thinking that that was quite possibly the most he’d ever heard his father say in a single sentence.


End file.
